Weekly Food for Thought – What is the next step? Upward, not just Forward!

Monday, February 18, 2013

What is the next step? Upward, not just forward!

‘We must be champions of change, because the only other alternative is to be victims of change.’ ~ Philip Mirvis

Dear Friends,

Have you ever found yourself feeling like you were trapped in a hamster wheel; no way out, going nowhere no matter how fast you moved … This is an important point, as many times and very often we find ourselves maintaining what we once created and never really took the time to see it from different angles and like scientists do, inspect our product’s efficiency, quality and sustainability. This often happens when we invest energy in maintaining and keeping ‘safe’ what we have once created.

There is very little joy and development and progress in maintaining the existing. The secret and joy lie in creating and developing and constantly improving.
If all you ever get from putting an extra hour of effort into one of your projects, is a proportional amount of work done, the only way to accomplish a magnitude more lies beyond the border of exhaustion. And that, of course, is no way to live a life. And a life without variation, a life of just living the same week over again and again, while the seasons change outside is … well, shall we just say – you deserve better?.

Perpetual improvement

For some people – like artists, the constant lifelong development of skill is part and parcel of what they do. The violoncellist keeps improving her technique on a daily basis throughout her life. The painter keeps improving his eyes. The actor continuously improves the distinctions regarding how to use his body, his voice, his emotions, his Self.

I was speaking to a programmer once, who said: ‘When I program, the important thing is not the product of my programming, but how I program myself during the process; what skills I acquire, who I become. I could perform my work duties without really developing my skills much, and then I would remain the same throughout the years. But going about it slightly differently I continuously increase me skill level.’

Development is essential. Most of the time, most of the people spend their time and energy working within an existing framework and running around in circles. In the best case scenario, they copy their own actions, thoughts, work from previous weeks, or in the worst case scenario, they copy other people’s actions, thoughts, work…

It is like the first barber in a town who never made an effort to invest and develop his services. Partly because he was the first and as such had no healthy competition. So when new barbers started sprouting up, he was more concerned with investing energy and time in maintaining the existing structure, rather than pause and think about HOW to improve and develop his services. Compare this with a worker at the Toyota assembly line, when he spots a problem, any problem, he pulls a string and the entire production line stops, the production team gathers and they find a way to change and improve the process. Or the farmer who finds his cow in a ditch, he spends the first part of the day getting the cow out, and the second figuring out how to prevent it from ever happening again.

So the point we are making here is not about working harder, making that hamster wheel spin an extra round, but about improving at selecting what to do and how to do it. Not by fighting harder, but by learning about tactics, by moving into the realm of strategy.

Like a spiral

A symbol comes to mind. You have certainly seen the spirally shaped shells. Each segment building onto the previously existing structure. Enlarging it. Evolving, creating a meaning, and NOT maintaining the same. To put it simply, would you rather be using your half a kilo old brick mobile phone or are you pleased with the creation of light sleek smart phones?

With this in mind, may we invite you to take some time, once a day (this is IMPORTANT!), to step outside your hamster wheels, reflect upon what you can learn from the last time you were engaged in any process and how to improve that process.

Thomas Björge – ITA NLP (International Trainers Academy of NLP) Accredited New Code and Classic Code NLP Trainer and Master Coach and Designer of New Code Game ‘Arrows’, to be featured in Dr. John Grinder’s upcoming book.